Chapter 90

The August heat was languid. The live house during the day was different from the night. A few feeble notes emerged from the crack in the door. The bassist, slumped uncomfortably over the table, asked the keyboardist, "How long has the boss been gone? Can we find someone suitable? We've met so many people before. If it were you, I'd just pick one that's okay. Otherwise, tonight's performance would be a disaster."

The keyboard player leaned back in his chair, holding his phone in a slumped manner and saying without looking up, "Boss, can you find someone suitable with those standards? I have no idea!"

The bassist sighed for a moment, then sat back in his chair, his chin resting on the back. Seeing the keyboardist's brow furrowed, he asked, "What are you doing? You've been clutching your phone since you walked in. Aren't you worried about it opening at night?"

The keyboard player hesitated for a moment, turned off his phone, took off his hat, and leaned back in his chair as if he wanted to rest.

"Just take a look."

"cut."

The bassist also became dazed.

They are a four-member band, consisting of a guitarist, bassist, keyboardist and drummer. The guitarist and lead singer is the soul of their band. The drummer fell a few days ago and broke his arm. They have one last performance in the live house today. If they can't find a suitable drummer, they will probably have to give up. They asked their friends in their circle of friends for introductions. They have interviewed several drummers in recent days, but the lead singer said no. Just now, the owner of the live house came to introduce another one. The lead singer just went for the interview. The bassist and keyboardist were both depressed. They stayed in the rehearsal room, each thinking about their own things.

At the front door of the live house, Zhou Li pushed open the heavy black door. The door was scorching from the scorching sun. She hissed, her fingertips burning, and pressed her shoulder against the door. The cool air inside hit her face unrestrainedly. Zhou Li looked inside. There was no light on, and it looked pitch black. It was like a man-eating monster was lurking in the darkness. Zhou Li raised her voice, "Excuse me?" She walked in, "I'm the drummer here for an interview."

The space was empty and footsteps echoed in the room. Zhou Li looked around and didn't see anyone. Facing him was the live house band's performance stage. All other instruments should have been taken away, and only a drum set stood alone on the stage.

Zhou Li went to the bar counter first. The darkness affected her vision. Zhou Li whispered, "Is there no one there?"

She asked the system in her head: [Are you sure it's here?]

System response: [Yes, I contacted the store owner directly.]

Zhou Li guessed that no one had arrived yet. The store had air conditioning and was more comfortable than outside. She sat casually on the bar stool, stretched out her long legs, and looked around.

It seemed that his eyes had adapted to the dark environment, and he could gradually see the decorations on the wall, which were very unique. He glanced at other places and tapped the table with his fingers out of boredom.

Perhaps due to his experience in the previous world, the mission in this world was unusually simple: to help the heroine form a band and complete the competition. Tonight was the heroine's band's final performance at the live house, and it was here that the heroine met the producer of a music program. With her recommendation, the heroine and her bandmates entered the competition, ultimately overcoming all obstacles and winning the final victory, becoming a sought-after band admired by the entire nation. From then on, their popularity soared, becoming world-class musicians and leaving behind countless popular songs. However, fate played a trick on the heroine: her drummer was injured, and the heroine, Shan Jia, was unable to find a suitable drummer, which meant that the evening's performance was postponed.

Zhou Li tapped the table with his fingers again.

Talented people all have their own pride. Shan Jia never compromises on her music. This overly demanding personality made her suffer a lot before she became famous, and now she has to live in a live house to perform. Some of the bands that appeared at the same time as her, after accepting commercial marketing, although their songs are not very good, are much more popular on the Internet than Shan Jia's band.

Zhou Lidong thought about it for a long time, but still no one came out to receive him.

Zhou Li felt itchy when she saw the lonely drummer on the stage, so she stood up and went on stage.

There was no drumstick, but luckily Zhou Li brought his own. It was more comfortable to use his own drumstick. When he struck the first note, Zhou Li frowned awkwardly. The drumhead was too loose and the tone was not accurate.

She tapped each drum with a drumstick, and after confirming the pitch, she tightened the screws of the drum stand, and tapped the drum again after the drum skin was taut until the pitch was right. She then stepped on the bass drum, but the bass drum pedal was too loose and the speed couldn't keep up. Zhou Li looked down for a long time, struggling and struggling, and finally bent down, knelt on the ground and adjusted the pedal. However, this made her hands and pants dirty. Zhou Li stood up and sighed, and a hand that glowed in the dark was handed to her, holding a wet tissue.

Zhou Li was stunned for a moment, and looked at the hand for a long time before realizing that the skin of the person in front of him was too white, which made him look like a glowing object in the dim light.

She took the wet tissue and looked up at the other person. The other person had a pair of narrow fox eyes that were opaque. In the dim light, his eyes were even darker, as deep as a well, sucking all the surrounding darkness into his eyes.

"Are you the drummer here for an interview?" the other party asked.

Zhou Li nodded, and at the same time confirmed in his heart that the other person was the heroine Shan Jia.

Shan Jia is about the same height as Zhou Li. When Zhou Li stands upright, their shoulders are comparable. Shan Jia looks thinner with slender shoulders. She wears a loose white T-shirt and loose pants. She is simply dressed without any accessories. Her hair just reaches her shoulders and seems to have just been combed. Her hairstyle is a little messy, but it highlights her facial features. Her nose is very upturned and her mouth is very thin. She looks like someone who is not easy to mess with.

She pursed her lips and said, "Sorry I'm late. Let's start the interview."

Zhou Li wiped his hands and nodded.

"You've never been in a band before?" Shan Jia asked, his tone unpleasant. "I remember the open recruitment requirements said you must have band experience."

"Can't I come if I don't have experience?" Zhou Li said innocently, "The boss didn't say anything, he just said they were short of a drummer and asked me to give it a try."

Shan Jia then remembered that this person was recommended by the live house owner, not recruited through open recruitment. She felt even more unhappy. The people recommended recently by the introducers were all praised more than the other, but they couldn't even reach the most basic pitch. If it weren't for the boss's long-term care for their band, Shan Jia didn't want to come to see him.

She sighed inwardly. The drummers she liked were all serving in other bands and were simply too busy to spare the time. It seemed that this farewell performance would truly be a farewell.

It is normal for musicians to borrow from each other because there are only a few good ones. Shan Jia is now beginning to regret that he is not popular in the circle, otherwise such a simple problem would not be solved.

Her face was dark as she heard Zhou Li ask, "Shall we start the interview? What do you want to hear?"

Shan Jia had no high expectations for Zhou Li, but she had just seen him tuning the instrument, and at least he was quite professional. She thought it was better to give her boss some face, so she nodded casually and said, "Play something you're good at."

"Anything is fine?" Zhou Li smiled. "I'm afraid I'll break this drum set."

Shan Jia thought Zhou Li was joking and said, "Go ahead."

Zhou Li picked up the drumstick and played with it in her hand. She smiled and said, "Obedience is worse than respect."

Zhou Li pulled up a stool and sat down. The first blast rang out, but Shan Jia didn't move. Then came the overwhelming drum beats, like a torrential downpour. Zhou Li played with such enthusiasm that she didn't care what anyone around her thought. She was like a blaster, eager to beat the audience's brains out. Someone who didn't know what she was doing might wonder what she was beating out. But Shan Jia's eyes lit up!

Her narrow eyes were wide open, as if she had met a treasure!

This kind of excitement feels like an electric shock throughout the body, the scalp tingles, the heart beats like a drum, and all the notes are hit firmly, making people feel at ease and calm!

The strength is too superb! It is simply outstanding!

The back door of the previously deserted hall suddenly flung open. The keyboardist and bassist huddled together, their necks strained to see who was producing the explosive drumbeats. Even the boss, who had been arguing with Shan Jia over her stubborn personality and lack of compromise, was drawn in. He squeezed in behind the two of them and anxiously said, "Let me see too! If not, go in!" The three grown men huddled together.

The more Zhou Li played, the more unrestrained she became. She stepped on the pedals and made a lot of noises with the drumsticks in her hands. The banging and snapping sounds seemed to shake the whole house, which also danced along with her drumsticks, making people want to shake their bodies involuntarily and toss their heads!

With the sound of heavy blows, before everyone present could react, the drum set collapsed with a loud bang. Just as Zhou Li said, the drum was broken into pieces by her.

The three big men finally squeezed in through the narrow door at the back. Before they started shaking their heads, they were startled by the sound of drum cymbals falling to the ground and almost jumped up. The three of them had exactly the same movements and expressions. Zhou Li was still sitting on the stool with an innocent look on his face. Fortunately, no one was hurt. Only the cymbals rolled all over the ground and were picked up by the bassist.

"Awesome!" The bassist put the cymbals on the stage and jumped up with his hands.

Zhou Li stood up and smiled, looking at Shan Jia. Shan Jia had retracted her previous expression and acted extremely calm, as if she had heard the performance of a drummer like Zhou Li many times.

The bassist and Shan Jia are old friends, so how could he not see the excitement hidden under her calm expression? Shan Jia is a person who has high standards and strict requirements for music. Ordinary people are simply not in her eyes. She either doesn't do it, or she will do it to the best of her ability. Because of this, the level of their band's music is very high, but the music is too high-brow for the masses. So far, the band's playback volume is not as good as some popular songs. Without traffic, there is no publicity, and the band's survival is becoming increasingly difficult.

The bassist sighed inwardly at the thought, but smiled broadly. He patted Shan Jia's thin shoulder and said, "Boss, let's pick her!" Such a good drummer, why not sign her up quickly? Now there's no need to worry about the evening performance being delayed, and there's still a few hours to get used to it. A drummer of this caliber will surely get along quickly, as long as she's willing to cooperate with them.

Shan Jia was still looking at Zhou Li, and Zhou Li showed an eight-tooth smile.

At this moment, the light above her head suddenly lit up, and a beam of dim light shone on her. Then the whole hall was lit up. Shan Jia stretched out his right hand and said, "Welcome to the Windmill Band. I'm Shan Jia, the band's guitarist and lead singer."

Zhou Li smiled brightly and shook the hand that Shan Jia offered her. She introduced herself: "Zhou Li, drummer."

The boss came out of the switchboard room, scratching his head and asked, "Did you agree? Let's have dinner?"

He was busy all morning and didn't even have breakfast. He was starving.

Shan Jia originally wanted to drag Zhou Li to rehearsal right now, but he nodded lightly when he heard this.

The boss clapped his hands in joy. This stubborn donkey finally listened to him!

When they arrived at the restaurant, the boss ordered the dishes without hesitation and asked the waiter to bring them. The bassist asked for wine, but the boss slapped his head twice and said, "Why are you drinking? It's not going to delay your performance tonight!"

The bassist covered his head in grievance, while the keyboardist was still holding his phone absent-mindedly.

The boss poured the drink and placed it directly in front of Zhou Li, saying smugly, "I saw your video online and I thought you'd be a good fit! That stubborn donkey, um, Xiao Dan'er, doesn't believe in my judgment! How many years have I been running this live house? I've seen so many bands, my eyes are sharp!"

Zhou Li laughed, the corners of her mouth curled up, and she looked at Jue Lu, oh no, Shan Jia, Shan Jia had no expression on his face, and drank the drink slowly.

Noticing Zhou Li's gaze, she looked over and nodded lightly, acting very aloof. There was a sense of distance around her, and it seemed that she was indeed difficult to get along with.

But it is often very simple to convince such people, all you need is absolute strength, which Zhou Li just happens to have.

"Boss, did you find her online?" the bassist exclaimed in surprise. He was a young man who loved to joke around, and he joined the boss in trying not to let the words fall onto the table. "What video is it? Can I see it?"

The boss looked at Zhou Li, and Zhou Li smiled and explained, "I'll upload some teaching videos online. Boss Qian was chatting with me privately backstage. We were chatting and we were quite close, so I came over. I've never formed a band before, so I wanted to come and have some fun."

Seeing the bassist couldn't wait, Zhou Li said, "Go to Orange Video and search for Little Frog and you can find me."

Orange Video is the most popular video platform among young people nowadays. The bassist also plays guitar and sometimes posts videos of his band's performances. However, his band isn't popular, and neither is he, with only about two thousand followers. He immediately pulled out his phone and searched for Little Frog. Then he exclaimed, "Wow!" and stammered, "Is it the frog with 200,000 followers, or the one with only a dozen?"

Zhou Li was a little embarrassed to brag about herself, but the boss said first: "Of course it's the 200,000 fans!"

The bassist looked surprised, even the keyboardist who had been silent and dazed looked over, and Shan Jia was also stunned for a moment.

Anyone who can reach 200,000 fans on Orange Video is more or less an internet celebrity. I didn't expect the boss to find such a person. It's like a relief for their band. Although most bands look down on "musician" internet celebrities who hype themselves up on the Internet, you have to say that in today's era where traffic is king, their tickets sell out quickly, while when they hold a performance, not only is no one watching, but sometimes they even lose money. Most of the time, they just go to warm up for big bands, and there are not many listeners in the audience.

"How amazing!" The bassist exclaimed as he flipped through Zhou Li's video.

Zhou Li's face is not shown in any of her videos. She wears a mask and a hat in every video, covering her face tightly. The videos are narrated with text, and then she plays the drums, which is particularly boring. It is also an instructional drumming video. The reason why this type of video has so many fans today is indeed because of her personal charm. Even the boring instructional videos without talking can make people watch them with gusto. Many people call her husband in the comment section, and there are so many dirty words that the bassist was shocked when he saw it, and suspected that he was not visiting a comment section, but a brothel.

Zhou Li blushed, she didn't know where she went wrong. It was obviously a serious video, and it didn't cross the line, but there were not many people coming to listen to the teaching, and the comment section was full of vicious words. Zhou Li used to control the comment section, but later more and more people started talking, so she gradually gave up and just let everyone be happy.

Zhou Li: =-=

Zhou Li coughed and explained, "I've been playing for too long." She wanted to skip the topic, but the bassist came up to Shan Jia with his phone and showed it to her, "Boss, listen to this, the rhythm is so special!"

The volume of the phone was low, and Zhou Li leaned over to listen to the rhythm. Suddenly, among the dense barrage of comments in the video, a very conspicuous barrage appeared and stopped in the middle of the video: [Ahhh, my husband is using his finger to suck me]

Because the wording was extremely inappropriate, it was harmonized by the platform and deleted. However, everyone here is smart and has been surfing the Internet for many years. Even if it was deleted, they can still guess which word was harmonized.

Zhou Li blushed with embarrassment and felt so upset that she wished she could find a hole to crawl into!

Why do we need to turn on the barrage? Isn’t it turned off by default when playing videos?

Shan Jia glanced at Zhou Li out of the corner of her eye. She wanted to laugh, but she suppressed it. However, the corners of her mouth couldn't help but curl up. But she asked in a serious tone, "Where did you get this rhythm?"

Zhou Li blushed and replied, "I just typed it randomly. I thought it sounded good at the time, so I released it."

Shan Jia placed his right hand on his thigh and tapped along to the rhythm. After the two-minute video finished, it had to start over again. Zhou Li couldn't stand the embarrassment of having to start over again, so he said, "I have the full rhythm on my phone, just watch mine."

Zhou Li took out her cell phone and played the audio track she had recorded. Shan Jia was sitting next to her and leaned over. Zhou Li smelled the fresh soapberry scent on her, which was very clean and comfortable.

Shan Jia narrowed her eyes slightly and played the drums in unison. After playing, she said, "Let's add each other on WeChat and you can send it to me."

"Oh, okay." Zhou Li didn't ask what she was doing. The two of them added each other on WeChat. Zhou Li sent the audio track. Shan Jia received the file and said, "I wrote a song. Your rhythm is quite suitable for it. I'll let you listen to it when I finish it. It's still a work in progress."

The bassist sat back down, and as the dishes began to arrive, he proudly declared, "The songs our band performs are all original, with lyrics and music all written by Shan Jia!"

Zhou Li glanced at Shan Jia, who was breaking his chopsticks, and smiled, "I know."

Shan Jia glanced at her, and Zhou Li took the chopsticks handed to her by the live house owner and lowered her head to pick up some food.

Shan Jia originally thought that Zhou Li didn't understand their band, but now it seems that this is not the case at all. He doesn't know why Zhou Li chose their Windmill Band, but they are a band that is about to sink. He hopes that they can part ways amicably after tonight.

The keyboard player opposite had his phone on the table ring three times. He looked down at the message and glanced at Shan Jia. His eyes were a little red, but he suppressed them and continued eating. Only the happy bassist knew nothing and was still chatting with the boss.

After dinner, the weather was getting hotter. We left the air-conditioned restaurant and walked a few steps on the street. We started sweating profusely. After finally walking back, the bassist drank another bottle of water to regain his energy.

The boss had something urgent to do and didn't come back with them, so he asked them to rehearse well.

The rehearsal room was fully equipped. Zhou Li saw the drum set placed in the corner at a glance. She took out her drumsticks and struck it a few times. The sounds of the drumhead in different places were thick and fat, and the thin cymbals also sounded clear. It was a good drum set.

The bass was plucked a few times on the bass glove, like a mellow bass, flowing gently in the room. The treble keyboard joined in at some point, like a soprano singer suddenly raising the pitch of the song. The guitar also blended in silently, with a refreshing and inclusive male voice, and together they composed a complete harmony.

Zhou Li also played the drums, using the drum beats as a baton to direct the direction of the entire piece.

It was just a simple collaboration, but it revealed everyone's level. Zhou Li and Shan Jia's levels were obviously higher than the other two, and in the end it unknowingly became a contest between the two of them. The drums became more and more wild, and the guitar chords were plucked very quickly. The bassist and keyboardist stopped because they could no longer keep up with the rhythm of the two. The intense melody like a horse race reached the end, making people feel refreshed and sweaty.

The bassist and keyboardist looked at each other in surprise. They had never seen such a wild side of the lead singer. They were both a little dejected at the same time. Their music was too highbrow and their level could not keep up with Shan Jia. It was Shan Jia who had always been accommodating them.

Even a carefree man like the bassist could hear the joy in Shan Jia's guitar. This newcomer was truly amazing, no matter from which aspect.

Zhou Li raised the corners of her mouth. The air conditioning in the rehearsal room was turned up high, but sweat appeared on her forehead. She looked at Shan Jia provocatively, and there was also a glimmer of defiance in Shan Jia's eyes. The two looked at each other, sparks flew, and the bassist's lamenting voice brought them back to their senses.

"Boss, isn't it time to rehearse our song for tonight?"

Shan Jia retracted her gaze, picked up a stack of white paper on the sofa next to her and handed it to Zhou Li, saying, "You get familiar with it first." Then she turned to the other two members of the band and said, "Let's practice first, and she will catch up later." It seemed that she was very confident in Zhou Li's ability.

The curve of Zhou Li's mouth grew wider, and she flipped through the music score with a smile in her eyes.

The band began to practice, with Shan Jia serving as guitarist and lead singer. Zhou Li raised an eyebrow as he listened to her smoky voice, which was unexpectedly magnetic and hoarse, completely different from the tone of her voice just now.

Shan Jia is an unexpectedly interesting and surprising person.

Shan Jia